Convert PDF to text
Drop a PDF and pull out its text as a plain .txtfile or as Markdown. The text is extracted from the document's own text layer, entirely in your browser, so the file never leaves your device.
About PDF to text
This tool reads the text layer a PDF already contains — the selectable, copyable characters stored inside the file — and writes them out as a single text or Markdown document. It works well for PDFs exported from a word processor, a web page, or any tool that embeds real text. Choose plain text for a clean .txt file, or Markdown for a .md file that marks each page break with a divider.
It is not OCR. A scanned page or an image-only PDF stores pictures of words, not the words themselves, so there is no text layer to extract and the output will be empty. The Markdown output is deliberately best-effort: a PDF records where each run of text sits on the page, not whether it is a heading or a list, so we keep the extracted text faithful rather than guessing at structure.
The first time you use this tool, your browser does a one-time setup to load the PDF engine. It is cached afterwards, so later extractions start straight away.
Is it private?
Yes. The extractor is WebAssembly and browser APIs running on your own machine. Nothing is uploaded, stored, or seen by us. There is no server to send files to.
Frequently asked questions
- Does this read scanned or image-only PDFs?
- No. This tool extracts the PDF's existing text layer — the characters the document actually stores. It is not OCR. A scanned document or an image-only PDF has no text layer, so it comes back empty. If your PDF is a photo of a page, you'll need optical character recognition instead, which this tool does not do.
- What's the difference between plain text and Markdown?
- Plain text gives you a .txt file with each page's text separated by a blank line. Markdown gives you a .md file with the same extracted text and a horizontal-rule divider between pages. The Markdown output is best-effort: a PDF stores positioned text runs, not headings or lists, so we don't guess at structure — we keep the text honest and just mark the page breaks.
- Are my files uploaded to a server?
- No. The extraction runs on your device using WebAssembly and browser APIs. Your PDF is never sent anywhere, and the tool keeps working even if you go offline after the page loads.
- Is it free, and do I need an account?
- It is free with no watermarks, no daily caps, and no sign-up. Drop a PDF, pick a format, and download the result.